


Make This Last

by thelaughingmagician



Series: Kyro [2]
Category: X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: F/M, X-men - Freeform, from ten years ago man i'm old, this is a repost of an old fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-21
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2019-02-17 19:19:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13083636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelaughingmagician/pseuds/thelaughingmagician
Summary: Emma Frost has taken a new interest in Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, while new X-Men battle with problems of their own as well as the reappearance of old friends. Sequel to The Boy Who Destroyed the World. [archive of old fic]





	1. Chapter 1

“I miss you so much, a self-inflicted coma  
The days drag on like marathons running with bare feet  
And when I feel the stress, I'm lonely and depressed  
I picture you in the dress you wore four weeks ago”

~ Hawthorne Heights “Decembers” ~

 

**Chapter 1**

Emma Frost stared up at the school. The sunlight cascading from newly laid windows hit her blond hair like a spotlight, giving away her presence to anyone within viewing distance. She was not a common sight—especially not in this part of New York.

A millionaire, she spent most of her time buying new things and degrading ‘regular people.’ But her definition of regular people was slightly different than the media portrayed. A powerful telepath and psionic expert, she was rivaled only by Professor Charles Xavier himself when it came to her mental powers.

She was known to be dangerous, rumored to have affiliated with Magneto’s Brotherhood of Evil mutants for a while, as well as attempting to reorganize it after his disappearance. But now she was nothing but an ordinary woman. At least that was how she was going to present herself.

Walking through the front doors with a grace that demanded all present notice her, Emma made her way past the construction—the school still wasn’t entirely rebuilt—and towards Xavier’s office. She was here for one reason.

She was looking for a job.

XXXXXXXX

Kitty sat behind her desk. It had only been a little over a year since the Professor had returned, and he’d just asked her to do the one thing she had never thought she would be asked. He’d asked her to become a teacher at his new school.

She was young, but no longer a kid. Even Logan had made a comment about how she would be distracting men all over just by walking down the street. No, Kitty Pryde was no kid anymore.

And yet…there were moments where she felt too young for all of this. The fight with the Sentinels had changed them all, but no one as much as Kitty. In that day she’d gotten her first kiss that was worth anything to her, professed her love for someone who she’d hated months before, and single-handedly found the only possible solution that had saved their— _most_ of their—lives.

Now she was a teacher. The school hadn’t reopened yet, but the students were moving into their rooms—the Professor had made sure those were built first, even before his own private quarters. And for the first time in nearly two years the place was full of life again.

But her heart was dead.

Warren walked into the room—he had to walk sideways to fit through the new doors with his wings—with a smile on his face, and Kitty couldn’t help but smile in return. “What?” She asked. “You’ve got that look on your face again.”

“What look is that?” He asked.

“The one that says you’re either about to get me in trouble or make my day.” She answered, standing up to walk over to him.

Warren smiled proudly. “I just thought I’d let you know that he’s back.”

Her heart stopped.

“Really?” Kitty asked, eyes lighting up. And right away Warren realized his mistake.

“Yeah.” He replied, though a bit unsure now. “Says the courts agreed to let him stay here under the Professor’s watch.”

The immediate look of disappointment washed over her face, and Kitty tried to hide it with a forced smile when she realized that Warren hadn’t been talking about John at all. Yes, that was what she’d hoped. But day after day of hoping and not hearing a word, she was getting tired of waiting.

And hoping.

“So where is he?” She asked.

“He’s in the lobby.” Warren replied, and they both headed for the lobby.

“Did he say anything else?” Kitty asked. “Are there any special rules we have to maintain while he’s here?”

“Just that he can’t leave campus without one of the staff.”

Kitty nodded, then her smile returned and she ran forward, wrapping her arms around the handsome figure who stood in the lobby. “I missed you!” She told him, face pulling away from the hug long enough to give him a quick kiss.

He smiled, eyes flickering a bit redder for a moment. “Told ya I’d be back, Chere.” He winked at her, and Kitty’s smile grew.

“Yeah, but there was the possibility of them locking you away for good, Remy.” She pulled away from him, smile still lingering. But she was greatly bothered, because in that moment when Warren had told her he was back, she had hoped it was John and not Remy.

How long had she been with Remy? A month or two, or close to that. And yet things lately had seemed sort of…well, the fireworks were gone. And it was probably because she was still waiting for John to show up.

But he never would.

She’d decided that this realization would mean her survival in the weeks to come. She was going to be a teacher, and her mind needed to be focused on that, not the long lost love of someone she never should have expected to stay put to begin with.

XXXXXXXX

The older woman realized there was no way out. She was going to die, and she was going to die by fire. If the smoke didn’t suffocate her first. But there were worse ways to die than asphyxiation. But even worse, the firemen were at least ten minutes away—perks of having your own land in the middle of what little nowhere was left in the state of New York.

Heat that was unbearable bore in against her from all sides, and as she reached for the door handle, her hand jumped sharply back in response to the intense heat it came in contact with.

Then she heard it—the sound of glass not only breaking, but being forcefully shattered. And following the sound appeared a young man, seemingly unaffected by the fire around him. But then the fire wasn’t really around him—it was surrounding him, but not touching him. And as he walked towards her it kept its distance, until he was standing next to her, and the heat was suddenly less intense.

“You okay?” He asked, but didn’t wait for an answer. He started running, the older woman in his arms as he made his way quickly through the doorway and out into the surrounding clearing. Once a safe enough distance away from the fire, he set her down on the ground and started running back towards the house.

“Wait!” She said, and he paused, glancing back at her. “Don’t leave me.” She looked so scared, and he groaned in frustration but obliged, standing still where he was. Then he performed a miracle.

The young man held his hands out in front of him, and as he stood there, the fire started to die down until her house was without even the tiniest flame. He turned to look at her as if nothing had just happened, as if this were as natural as a person walking.

“What is your name?” The woman asked, her heart still racing from what she’d just seen.

He looked at her, stared through strands of hair that had broken free during their flight from the house and were now hanging down in front of his eyes. “John.” Was all he said.

The old woman clutched her chest above her heart, and for a moment he actually thought she was having a heartache. Then she pulled some prayer beads out of her sweater and started praying in Spanish.

“What are you doing?” He asked, a bit annoyed by her reaction.

“I prayed for help and the Lord sent me a Saint.” She replied.

“I’m not a fucking Saint.” He muttered as he started walking away. But he stumbled, nearly fell, only barely catching himself.

“Are you hurt?” The woman asked.

He glared at her. “I’m fine.” John started walking away again, and this time he did not struggle to do so.

XXXXXXXX

“I heard that after the unfortunate loss of Dr. Grey, that you were hiring, Professor.” Emma could have won an Academy award for her performance, she was _that_ convincing. She seemed perfect for the job. But Charles Xavier could not access the deepest reaches of her mind and that bothered him only in the fact that she was keeping him from doing so.

A quick mind scan was not uncommon when he interviewed someone to be hired at the school. He wanted the children to be safe after all. And he hadn’t intended to reach those most personal thoughts of hers, but he had brushed past them and noticed their shadowed presence as they were kept from him.

He knew who she was. You couldn’t walk down a street without seeing a poster of her in a store window or on the TV. Emma Frost was the ultimate celebrity—rich, blond, and single. But Charles also knew the things she did when the media _wasn’t_ watching.

“I know what you must be thinking.” Emma said, smiling. “But I really am looking for a new life out here. I want to get away from all the bad press.”

Bad press was an understatement.

“You tried to kill one of my current staff when I went to her house to get her as a student.” He pointed out.

“You still remember that.” She said with a slightly nervous laugh. “Yeah, I’ve been meaning to apologize to her for years now. And I wasn’t actually going to _kill_ her.” He just stared at her as she spoke.

And for a moment Xavier actually considered turning her away. But, if he were to keep her nearby, perhaps he could find out what she was up to much quicker. And he knew she had to be up to _something_.

“Classes begin in a month.” He explained. “We hope to have the rest of the school completed by then.”

XXXXXXXX

Kitty laid on her bed, trying to fall asleep. But sleep wasn’t coming, in fact it was fighting against her. Then she did something she’d been telling herself not to—she phased through the bed and laid there underneath it.

And she smiled at the memories that this brought. Closing her eyes she could almost hear the rain that had fallen almost every day she’d spent with John. And then she opened her eyes again and sighed, sitting up through the bed.

He was gone, and she was supposed to accept it, right?

Kitty stood up, tugging at her pajamas nervously. She needed to talk to Remy, and she needed to talk to him right away.

His door was open, and she walked over to the window, finding him in his usual hiding spot—the branches of the tree right outside of the window. He found peace out there, able to look at the city without actually having to deal with it. And besides, he liked the fresh air. It was much better than the damp air he’d been forced to breathe while in prison.

“Hey.”

He smiled, turning to look at her, and flipped the card in his hand. Then, with one quick jump, he was standing in the room next to her. “What brings ya here ‘dis time of night, Chere?”

She sighed and looked at the ground, and suddenly Remy knew why she was there. But then she did something he did not expect, she grabbed his face and kissed him. Their faces lingered close for a moment after the kiss broke, and then she took a step back, looking at him, a bit disappointed.

“Remy, have you ever slept under a bed?” She asked.

And he, thinking this the oddest and most random question she could ask, laughed. “ ‘dis some kinda kinky invitation?” He asked her.

“I’m serious!” Kitty snapped.

He looked at her for a moment through those red eyes, just taking in the expression on her face, then spoke quietly. “You didn’t come here ta’ ask me that.” Kitty looked at the ground, unsure how to start.

“I…” She looked up at him. “For the last few weeks, things have just seemed…” She paused again. “I mean things between you and I have just felt…”

“Uncomfortable?” He offered, and she was surprised to see the look of understanding that came over his face when she nodded. “Yeah.” Remy told her. “I felt it too, Chere.” He pulled out a deck of playing cards from an inside pocket of his trench coat and started thumbing through them absent mindedly. “Ya’r still in love with him.” Kitty’s mouth fell open.

“It’s okay.” He said, smiling at her. “I understand.”

“I mean, I like you, but…”

“It’s okay.” He assured her, giving her a look that said it really was okay. “Ya seem more like a sista’ anyway.” He winked at her, and she laughed.

“You always kiss your sisters like that?” Kitty asked.

“Chere, you da one that kissed me.” He pointed out.

XXXXXXXX

 

He’d been watching them for a while now through the window. John had seen them laughing and smiling, he’d even seen them kiss. And his first reaction was to throw some flames at the red-eyed bastard. But he was able to control himself as he started towards the front doors of the newly built school.

The place had been built the same—at least as far as outward appearance showed. He sort of wished they had built it completely differently. It just wasn’t the same. He relaxed a little when he walked through the doors and found the interior different. It felt…more like home.

Or maybe that was just because he knew she was there.

John knew he hadn’t called, written, hell not even _tried_ to contact her in any way since he’d walked away. But he’d only done all those things to make it easier on himself, because the moment he heard her voice, the instant he held anything that reminded him of her, he knew it would break him and he’d be right back to her side.

Only now he had no choice.

He had to see her face at least one more time before she threw him back onto the streets for being such a prick. Though somehow he doubted she would do that—it was just against her nature. She’d taken him in long before they’d become friends even.

Turning a corner, John very suddenly found himself in what served as a living room/gathering place. There was a TV sitting on a table near the corner, and a couple couches. All in all it looked comfortable, a place someone could really live in. You’d almost forget it was a school.

The first one to see him was Winged-Boy, and John wasn’t exactly happy about that. He was the reason for the cure after all, which had led to so many different problems, not only in his life but thousands of others.

“Oh, hey.” Warren said, a bit surprised to run into John Allerdyce of all people.

“Hey.” John replied indifferently. “She around?” He asked, and there was no need to clarify who he was asking about.

“Follow me.” Warren turned around, folding his wings tighter against his back as he started walking. And John followed him, neither talking the entire time, as they made their way upstairs towards Remy’s room.

He heard laughter on the other side of the door— _her_ laughter. And then Kitty opened the door, and her smile faded as her hand phased through the door handle without her meaning for it to. She opened her mouth but couldn’t speak.

 


	2. Chapter 2

“[True Love burns the brightest, But the brightest flames leave the deepest scars.](http://en.thinkexist.com/quotation/true_love_burns_the_brightest-but_the_brightest/194010.html)”

~ Unknown ~

 

**Chapter 2**

So there they stood, on either side of the room—John leaning back casually against the wall, Kitty standing there with her arms hanging at her sides—staring at each other. She was glad they’d decided to go up to her room to talk, because Kitty didn’t want the others to see her like this, all dumbfounded and without words.

“You never called.” She started finally.

“Didn’t have the number.” He answered in all honesty.

“You could have written.”

“Wasn’t an address yet.”

She sighed, looking at him. And he looked back at her. She’d changed a bit, looked more mature, and her hair was longer—she wore it curled now. But she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

And he, she noticed, looked tired. The way he was leaning against the wall it almost seemed as if he was doing so to keep standing. But she didn’t ask if he wanted to sit down. He wouldn’t be there long enough.

“So, red eyes?” John asked.

“Yeah.” Kitty answered. She wanted John to think she’d moved on, that he hadn’t held her back.

“Why?”

“Was I supposed to just stop everything and wait for you?” Kitty asked, and though the question was an accusation, she spoke calmly.

“No.” John replied. “But why a French guy?”

“He’s not French.” She snapped.

John nodded. “Right.” He thought for a moment, looking at the ground, and then looked up at her. “So, you’re a teacher already?”

“Yes.” Kitty said. “And you…” She hesitated. “All those wildfires that just mysteriously died away…” He looked away. “That was you, wasn’t it?” John didn’t answer, and she knew it had been him.

She’d followed his trail for a while, trying to catch up to him, but every time she had gotten there all she’d found was a bunch of smoke and some very confused firemen. So, figuring he didn’t want to be found, she’d given up.

“Bobby left.” Kitty said suddenly, not sure why she felt the need to tell him that.

“I don’t care about Bobby.” John said, and he was being completely honest.

“Why are you back, John?” She finally asked, sighing.

He looked up at her, considered telling her the truth, and then decided against it. “I was in the neighborhood.”

“In the neighborhood?” She asked, scoffing in disbelief. “John, I moved on!” Kitty told him. “I waited and you never came back, so I fucking moved on!”

“Do you ever sleep under your bed?” He asked, and it surprised her how he was still calm, hadn’t shouted back in response.

Kitty looked at the floor. “Sometimes.” She couldn’t lie to him, because she knew what he was _really_ asking her.

He didn’t give a damn if she slept under her bed, he was actually asking if there were times—even if only _moments_ —where she had missed him. Because John Allerdyce needed to know he hadn’t been the only one suffering from this. Even if he had brought it upon them.

They looked at each other for another few minutes, just standing there in awkward silence. Then Kitty walked over to stand in front of him, and she reached into her pocket, pulling his lighter out. He noticed it, but he kept his eyes on her face.

“You forgot this.” She said quietly, holding her hand out for him to take it.

He hesitated, and when he finally did reach for the lighter, his hand lingered on hers. Kitty lifted her head to look up at him. “You came back.” She whispered, face near his.

“And I always will.” He replied quietly, his face moving closer.

“John…” She started to say something, but it didn’t matter at all what she’d been about to say, because Kitty kissed him instead. _She_ kissed him.

And in that moment, everything they had hoped had faded after a year, all the emotions and dreams and hopes, they came rushing back into them with new life, as if they’d never left at all, and perhaps they hadn’t. His lips and hers, and nothing else mattered but the way he had his arms around her now, and her hand dropped his lighter to the floor to rest on his back instead.

Kitty was surprised as hell to feel tears on his face when she reached up to touch it with her other hand, and she pulled her mouth away for a moment. “Are you okay?” She asked, suddenly overwhelmingly concerned for him.

“For the first time in a long time.” He answered, smiling slightly. She held his face, and then lifted her head to softly kiss the tears away.

It was profound, a moment they would never forget. And as they started kissing again, and Kitty gripped his shirt while pulling him towards her bed, they realized that to be apart again would never be possible for either of them.

XXXXXXXX

 

“Should we go check on them?” Warren asked, and he raised an eyebrow as the Professor smiled.

“I don’t think they want to be interrupted right now.” He said, closing his mind from both John and Kitty. At least for a little while. He liked to make sure everyone was okay, but there were moments even he wouldn’t take.

“Should we call Bobby?”

The Professor looked up at Warren. “He’s not in any condition to speak to anyone right now. Let alone John Allerdyce.”

Bobby had taken Rogue’s death harder than most—maybe even worse than Scott had handled Jean’s death. Only this time, there was no chance that Rogue would be coming back like Jean had. Bobby Drake was a broken man.

And the last they’d heard, he was staying with an old friend—a former student of Xavier’s actually. So the Professor would not worry about him as long as Lorna Dane was around to help Bobby. And she would, because the both of them had been good friends long before Rogue had ever even arrived at the school.

“So he’s da’ one dat’ left her?” Remy asked, still trying to figure out exactly who John was.

“Yes.” Warren answered. “I mean, he had good reasons and all, but she was still…I don’t think she ever got over it.”

Kitty’s uncharacteristic quietness for the first few weeks after John had left had been the biggest clue for them all. She’d speak with the Professor, and she talked to Warren every once in a while, but those first few days had been rough.

“Well,” Warren said, “I’m going to go watch some TV. Beats standing here.” His wings twittered a bit, and Charles knew the boy was getting antsy spending all his time in a school that was still being rebuilt. But he’d never return to live with his father. At least not at this time in his life. But who knew what the future would hold?

So Warren left the room, this time deciding to bend over slightly to fit through the doorway, and made his way to the lobby, where the only currently functioning TV set was.

A loud thud made him turn his attention from the TV set to back behind him and the couch, where Warren was very shocked to see Kitty—barely wrapping a blanket around her naked self before he saw anything—laying. She stood up, looked at him with wide eyes, and then took off running back up the stairs faster than he’d ever seen her run.

Warren just chuckled and went back to watching TV.

Emma Frost watched him from a distance, where she stood in the hallway. Worthington seemed unfazed by the random appearance of a naked girl, and that actually surprised her. He was, though, the X-Men with the most potential for what she had in mind. After all, had Judas been an Angel, he may have gotten away with a lot more.

XXXXXXXX

She stared at him. “I phased.” Kitty told him, and John almost laughed because that much was already very obvious and yet she still felt the need to say it. “It’s your fault!” She said, smacking his shoulder playfully.

“Well, I would hope so.” John told her with a cocky grin.

“So, you and Mr. I’m-not-from-France ever…?” John asked, managing to keep a straight face until she dropped the blanket and threw a pillow at him.

XXXXXXXX

They were rebuilding the school. He couldn’t believe it. Hadn’t Charles had his students through enough already to know that the school was just not a good idea? Yet he would never stop trying.

Eric Lehnsherr knew that better than most that Charles would never give up on fighting for the good.

And yet, as he listened to Sebastian Shaw’s proposal, he wondered if even the X-Men would be able to defeat such a well thought-out plan. The Hellfire Club, after all, was known to the general public as a respectable club for upper class citizens to congregate.

Only a few knew what it was truly capable of, as well as its reasons for assembly.

“You truly expect me to believe that you have the power to do what you are suggesting?” Eric asked, playing the part of the skeptic.

“We have enough power and more.” Shaw replied with a sinister smile. “I would expect a man like you,” He motioned to the scars on Magneto’s face, “Would want to get at them any way you could.”

Yes, the X-Men had left him for dead, buried beneath burning rubble. And that had not left him unmarked. What had once been a face of grace and elegance was now replaced with the scarred remains of a man who wanted only one thing.

Revenge.

XXXXXXXX

They’d fallen asleep in each others arms. She was the first to wake up a few hours later, glancing over at the window to see that it was now dark outside as night had crept up on them. Kitty looked back at John and smiled, head resting in her hand as she watched him.

“You know, there are few things in this life that are creepier than a beautiful woman watching you sleep.” He said, opening his eyes only after he’d spoken the entire sentence.

She smiled. “Did you just call me ‘beautiful?’ ”

John thought for a moment—he actually had to think back, because when he was around her sometimes the words said themselves and he didn’t remember them later. “I did.” He finally realized, not exactly sure how he felt about saying something like that aloud. But when he looked up and saw the light in her eyes, he was glad his tongue had decided to betray him for a moment.

“So,” Kitty said, lying her head on his chest, “You’ll be staying for a while?”

He stared at the ceiling, and once more thought about telling her the truth. “A while.” Was the reply he gave her.

She smiled. “Good.”

He did not smile with her though. John just stared up at the ceiling, arm around Kitty as she lay close to him, and he wished that this moment could last.

 


	3. Chapter 3

“And all these lines fall short of what I had in mind,  
A failed attempt to capsulize a feeling,  
So I just try,  
Fail and try and try again,  
Someday I swear I'm going to get it,  
Because I'm convinced that giving in is the worst thing there is,”

~ Straylight Run “Mistakes We Knew We Were Making” ~

 

 

**Chapter 3**

“Magik.” He repeated, when she wouldn’t answer to her real name. “Magik, are you listening to me?”

She glared up at Sebastian Shaw with a vengeance that he was sure could be carried out had she more experience in the art of sorcery. But she was only a teenager, barely older than a girl, and he had kept her locked in this room for nearly a year.

“What do you want?” Her Russian accent was still very pronounced, considering that she hadn’t spoken her native tongue for months.

“You know what I want.” He gave her that creepy smile he always did when he was about to teach her some more magic. If it weren’t for the hope that someday her magics would overpower his and allow her an escape, she would not have cooperated.

And she would have hit him, but that only made him stronger.

“When can I see my brother?” she asked. How many times had she repeated this question over the last year? It seemed like forever since she had seen Peter. She knew he was probably dead by now—Kitty had made it clear that he didn’t have long when she had called. But, Illyana Rasputin, the girl who had come to call herself Magik, had been delayed.

“Once you have completed the task I brought you here for,” was Shaw’s reply. She looked up at him, confused, because this was the first time he had actually answered her question. Every other time he’d merely ignored it and given her his creepy smile as if it were some sort of answer.

But something had changed.

“What’s going on?” she asked, watching him with suspicious eyes now.

“Get up.” His conversational, almost friendly, tone had disappeared, and he seemed anxious, or even nervous now.

“Answer my question,” she told him, her voice a bit more demanding.

“Get up!” His voice boomed in the small room and she stood up.

She walked in silence, a few steps ahead, afraid to turn and look at the man. He constantly reminded her that if she tried to run the other Hellfire members would stop her with violence. He encouraged it after all.

The moment they entered the room, she sensed there was something wrong with it. It was too sterile, it even smelled like rubbing alcohol. It reminded her almost of a hospital, but even more of a morgue.

Her heart seemed to stop beating when her eyes caught sight of the medical table sitting in the middle of the room.

“So, _Magik_ ,” Shaw spoke her self-given name in mockery now, trying to intimidate the already frightened teenager, “do you finally realize why you’re here?”

She took a step forward without answering, moving slowly towards the table. She reached out a shaking hand to touch the face of what had once been a beautiful woman. Her skin felt rubbery, fake almost, and suddenly Illyana realized why this had felt so wrong.

Her hand moved back quickly to her side, and she turned to look at Shaw. “I won’t do it.” She glanced back at the dead woman—whom she recognized from some pictures her brother had sent home. “I _can’t_ ,” she added, hoping that he would believe her magics too weak for this task.

XXXXXXXX

John couldn’t sleep. Not while Kitty was lying there, her head still resting on his chest. He was suddenly very aware in the dark of the night that somewhere on the floor laid his precious Zippo.

He wanted to get up and find it, but he didn’t want to wake her. The way she was sleeping so soundly, he almost worried that Red-eyes _had_ kept her up most nights. It was as if she was finally getting sleep after being deprived for who knew how long.

Glancing down at her, he brushed a curl away from her face gently, and all that had happened since leaving her no longer seemed to matter, because he was back and she was _his_.

The wildfires _had_ been his doing, and he still wasn’t entirely sure what had caused him to put them out. Maybe he’d felt the need to do some good in this pathetic world after a few years of terrorizing it. Perhaps he’d just wanted her to notice him, to have a constant reminder that he was still around. But he hadn’t wanted her to see him saving the people; he’d just wanted her to know he was doing it. And she had.

John Allerdyce loved her completely. He had realized that more in those few moments when he had walked away from her than ever before. She’d taken him in, given him a real home, given him a friend, a lover, a savior. He owed her everything.

That was why he felt the pang of familiar guilt upon returning only now, because things weren’t exactly what she thought they were, and he hated to break her heart again.

Maybe it was fate, kismet, that they’d even met at Xavier’s school years before, that she had cared enough to clean him up and keep him hidden, that he’d stayed long after he was healed and able to leave. Maybe it was all just some fucking predestined plan drawn up by someone who could see the entire movie, beginning to end, rather than just the battle or death scenes.

Maybe.

Or maybe they’d just gotten lucky. Whatever it was, he hated it, because not only had it changed him almost completely, but it had made him _glad_ that he’d changed in some ways. 

He still hated that he saved people in trouble because he could, but especially afterwards when they looked at him with disgust and made remarks about mutants. He was finally seeing the hypocrisy that had always pissed Logan off so much from a hero’s point of view.

It still frustrated him beyond belief that he couldn’t _create_ fire, only control it. Half a power for a man that was only half good and even then his goodness centered on the woman who _owned_ his heart.

He had done it all for _her_.

John had told her once that she had saved him, and he found new reasons every day why that was so damn true. He had a purpose now, rather than just hate, a cause rather than just revenge. He was living for the first time since that moment his mother had discovered he was a mutant and dropped her glass onto the floor.

He hated it. John was absolutely resentful of the entire situation. He hated that he had something to look forward to, that he had someone whose smile brightened his day, that he no longer wanted to destroy everyone who got in his way. He hated it, because it just wasn’t in him to embrace this love perfectly, even after all he had seen and done, before and after Kitty had taken him in.

To accept this weakness merely at face value was something that he just could not do, and that had been one of his two reasons for leaving her. The first had been the very reason he had told her, and the second had been his own selfish fear that if he let her take over what little of his old personality was left, there would not longer be any hint of Pyro in John Allerdyce.

Pyro was a persona he had grown to hate, and yet he couldn’t just walk away from it. It had made him who he was today, who he had been yesterday, but _she_ made who he would be tomorrow. And that gave her complete control over his destiny.

John glanced down at Kitty’s sleeping form again, hand resting at the small of her back. He could feel her breathing calmly. It was a sign that she felt absolutely safe with him. The very fact that she had fallen asleep around someone who once had threatened her life, and nearly taken it more than once, was a testament to what she felt for him.

And he hoped that it didn’t mean that he had changed her the way she had changed him.

XXXXXXXX

Ororo stood up and started making her way towards the bus as it pulled into the station. The others hadn’t realized why she was leaving for the night, nor had they asked, but that hadn’t bothered her a bit. She was there to welcome an old friend.

There was a ‘bamph!’ that broke through the silent night air, and the smell of ozone, and suddenly she realized he hadn’t taken the door off of the bus. Storm turned around, her smile growing as she saw Kurt standing there and embraced him in a hug.

“Oh, it’s been too long!” she said.

“Zat it has,” he agreed, before ‘bamphing’ over to get his luggage and back. He ignored the glances that the other passengers gave him. “I vas sorry to hear about ze girl,” he added as they started walking towards her car.

For the slightest of moments her smile faded and her eyes were clouded over with grief. But it passed, and she looked up at him. “I’m just glad you’re back. We missed you.”

“Ze Professor has returned?” he asked, and looked confused at her nod. “How is this possible?”

“It’s…” she tried to think of a way to shorten the story and explanation that Xavier had given them and decided it wasn’t possible, “complicated.”

“No matter,” Kurt smiled, flashing brightly white teeth against his dark, blue skin. “I was glad to hear of it,” She matched his smile at those words.

Behind him, standing near the luggage compartment as the busdriver handed bags out, there stood a woman of exotic beauty. She watched the two mutants get into the car and drive away, and only then did the quick glimmer of yellow eyes betray her normal appearance.

XXXXXXXX

She opened her eyes suddenly and looked around, finding herself in complete and utter darkness. But the darkness confused her. She wasn’t aware of what she was feeling, only that it didn’t feel right, and everything about this was wrong.

She wasn’t supposed to be here.

What had happened? She remembered flashes of light, vague faces, blurs that rushed past. And then she remembered nothing.

Her wet hair clung to her face and neck, and she tried to brush it away but failed. Her hands were too weak—she could barely move them. Her fingers felt brittle. This was too wrong.

“Hello.” A voice.

She looked for the source of the oddly familiar voice, and her eyes—still not completely focused—aimed towards a faceless man. He was leaning down to speak to her, and she realized only then that she must be lying down.

“How are you feeling?”

The question was completely unnecessary. She knew that before he had even asked that he’d known the answer. Still, he had asked, maybe to see if she would talk. She sat up instead, hair flipping with the movement of her head as she looked around.

Her eyes were starting to focus a bit, her vision becoming clearer, but she still couldn’t see well enough to know what—and who—was around her. And she felt cold, tried to wrap her weak arms around herself to stop the chill, but failed because her arms wouldn’t bend. They argued with her, yelling that hinges that were once frozen weren’t meant to be used ever again.

Frozen.

That triggered something. A memory.

Her mind tried to figure out where that word had become so familiar to her and why it still meant so much. But the only conclusion that she came to was that the cold, hard table she sat on was making her shiver and that had somehow triggered the thought of the meaningless word.

“I’m sorry to bring you back again,” the voice continued, and she blinked, vision clearing slight to see that it was indeed a man that spoke, but the face was still unrecognizable. “But you see,” he cleared his throat, “I had no choice.”

Her head whipped to the side and she noticed that there was a third figure in the room. A girl huddled in the corner, radiating exhaustion as an almost physically manifested force. She was glowing, but the glow was dimming slowly.

She looked back towards the man who was speaking to her. Now she could see his face. She blinked again, and then focused on the features he presented just by looking at her. Grey hair, a helmet—also familiar to her—and eyes that told her she knew him from long ago. Or merely yesterday.

Time was a blur, a set of jumbled images that made no sense to begin with. And her mind was trying to grasp onto one of them, to take hold of any anchor it could reach.

“The Wolverine will be the most upset that I have brought you back again,” The man continued, and he had the slightest of smiles on his face again. “But then, it doesn’t take much to raise his temper.” There was amusement in the voice. He reached out to touch her arm, and she flinched.

She fell from the table onto the floor, found she was stronger now, but still weak. When she looked at her hands, they seemed dead, like a mannequin’s. But even as she watched, the skin seemed to reverse in age. Her strength was returning, and with that strength she felt wounds begin to heal.

Her hands reached up to her face, trying to find the source of the discomfort, because her wounds didn’t hurt, they just seemed…out of place. Her skin was covered with cuts and bruises, all of them healing right before her eyes, and she could _feel_ it underneath her hand.

“It’s quite alright,” the man told her, and there was something about his voice that gave her comfort. She knew this man; she’d known him before…before what?

When he held out a hand for her to take, she accepted, a bit hesitantly, and let him help her stand. Torn legs had healed enough to support her, and she was at his level now, could look into those age-old eyes.

“Welcome to the Brotherhood,” the man smiled and reached out to touch a strand of white hair that had fallen in front of her face, “Rogue.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

“they think that your early ending  
was all wrong  
for the most part they're right  
but look how they all got strong.”

~ Filter “Hey Man, Nice Shot” ~

(I love that song…)

 

**Chapter 4**

He woke up to the sound of yelling and jumped out of bed, only realizing after he was standing that Kitty wasn’t lying next to him, nor was she even in the room anymore. Instantly he figured something was wrong.

John threw his pants on quickly and ran out of the room, following the sounds of the shouting voices. He recognized one of them as Kitty, and the other sounded vaguely familiar but not enough so that he could put a face to it.

As he turned the corner to find Kitty yelling at none other than the infamous Emma Frost, he stopped and started to back away slowly.

"What are _you_ doing here?” Emma asked, and he supposed she’d sensed his mind before his actual presence. Kitty turned to look at him too, wondering how he knew the White Queen, but he didn’t know how to respond. “Say something.” Emma insisted.

Kitty returned her glare to the blond woman and started yelling again. “I refuse to believe that the Professor let you into the school, let alone gave you a job!”

Emma looked back at the younger woman with indifference. “I’m the new English, Ethics, and History teacher, so get used to it.”

“ _You_ teach _ethics_?!” Kitty spat in disgust.

“Why is that so hard to believe?” Emma asked, folding her arms in front of her and raising an eyebrow. “A person can change.”

“The first time I met you, you tried to kill the X-Men, not to mention confused the hell out of me and almost made me join your school!” Kitty snapped, and the way she was bunching her fists, John was afraid she’d strike out at the other woman.

He rushed over to her, pulling Kitty aside. “Look, she’s not someone you want to mess with,” he said, motioning back towards Emma.

“You know her?” Kitty asked.

He hesitated. “A little. She was…working with Magneto for a while.”

“Ha!” Kitty looked back at Emma with a proud smile. “I told you! There’s no way you could have changed because you were part of the Brotherhood!” The smile that crept across Emma’s lips told Kitty she’d just made herself look incredibly stupid.

“And what about you?” Emma asked, raising an eyebrow. “Sleeping with someone who’s a _member_ of the Brotherhood.”

“I’m not—” Kitty held up her hand, and he didn’t finish his sentence as she walked back over to Emma, giving her the darkest of glares.

“You know about that?” She asked.

Emma’s smile grew. “I have to get my thrills somehow.”

Kitty wanted badly to punch the other woman, to just knock her fucking teeth out. She was concentrating so hard on that mental image that she forgot that Emma could see her thoughts. Emma glared up at her, hatred flashing in her eyes, and John once more pulled Kitty aside. Or tried to, because Kitty just phased through him and stayed where she was.

“You stay out of my fucking thoughts!” Kitty screamed into Emma’s face, yelling so loud that the other woman actually took a step back. “If I ever find out you’ve taken something from me like that again, I swear I’ll kill you.” It was a threat that the three of them knew she would carry out too.

“What is going on?” They all turned to look at Logan, who had just walked into the room with a look that said he didn’t appreciate being woken up by something like this. He glanced at Emma, took in the details of her more-than-revealing outfit, then glanced at Kitty, recognizing her look of pure hatred, and finally his eyes rested on John. He looked at the shirtless mutant for a moment, and then grinned slightly. “Bout time you came back.” He gave John a wink that said he was also aware of their activities from the night before.

“Oh my gosh!” Kitty exclaimed in irritation. “Does _everyone_ know we slept together!” She glared at John like it was his fault.

“They do now,” Remy grumbled, walking into the room with the Professor and Warren behind him.

“Oh…” Kitty glanced nervously between Remy and John, as if expecting an inevitable fight to break out. It didn’t.

“Kitty,” she turned to look at the Professor as he spoke to her, “Miss Frost is going to be a part of the teaching staff here.”

“But—”

“And I expect you to be able to put aside your differences and work together for the students,” he continued, ignoring her argument. Kitty sighed and glared at Emma.

“No way,” she said without hesitation. “No way in hell.”

Warren smiled at this, and it was only after the Professor gave him a glance that he forced that smile away. John saw that Remy was looking suspiciously at Emma, as if he didn’t quite trust her. Knowing what he knew about the woman, John sure as hell couldn’t argue that.

XXXXXXXX

All night she had kept feeding Rogue with her magical strength, had continued to heal wounds that had been fatal and should have stayed that way. It had nearly killed Illyana, and now, the next morning, she could barely move.

Shaw walked over to her, smiling proudly. “See, this is why I kept you around.” Then he backhanded the girl, making Rogue—who was still flighty the way a spooked horse is—flinch. Illyana didn’t even try to wipe the blood away from her lips, she just turned her head and glared at him.

When he went to smack her again, something amazing happened: she simply disappeared. It was like the cheesy special affects of an old movie where they stopped filming and removed the actor to start up again. It was a disappearing act that left everyone in the tiny room—Shaw, Magneto, and Rogue shocked and confused.

“What just…”

“I’m not supposed to be here,” Rogue announced, looking down at herself. She still had no memory of her death, or what had led up to it. She had memory of only one thing: The X-Men. And she knew that she had to get to them, because they would know what to do.

“Of course you’re supposed to be here.” Magneto insisted, using a fatherly tone.

Rogue looked at Magneto, and his face brought back the image of only one thing: pain. He wasn’t anyone she wanted to be around, that much was clear. So, she stood up and started walking towards the door.

“You can’t leave,” Magneto told her, ignoring the worried glance that Shaw gave him for not physically stopping her. “You have nowhere to go.”

“Tha’ ain’t true.” Rogue said, glancing over her shoulder. “And ya know it.”

“You won’t want to find them,” he assured her. “You see, Rogue, you came back…different.” Magneto smiled when her worried eyes fell upon him in question.

“Get back on the table,” Shaw told her firmly, clearly not in the mood to play Magneto’s mind games.

“No,” she said, facing him. Rogue had never met the man, she was sure of that, but already she hated him.

“Sit back down!” he shouted. He appeared frustrated with Illyana’s ‘disappearance,’ and did not seem the type of man one should be testing when angry.

“No!” she yelled back. It hurt to yell; vocal chords that hadn’t been used for who knew how long were still fighting against working for her at all. But she got her point across, and it just made him angry. Rogue didn’t care.

XXXXXXXX

Magneto watched as Rogue appeared more restless and unsettled by her captivity, and as Shaw grew angrier with her increasing insubordination to his demands.

Magneto watched as Sebastian Shaw, his temper to be rivaled by no other force, reached out and grabbed Rogue by the arms, meaning to keep her there. He completely ignored Magneto’s warning before he did so. He noticed that Shaw was growing weak—a sign of Rogue’s mutation that he himself was quite familiar with. By the look of surprise and shock on Shaw’s face, it was probably the first time that had ever happened. Shaw fell to his knees, gasping, and Rogue looked down at him then back up at herself and finally at Magneto.

Erik was not an idiot. He knew now that Rogue possessed Shaw’s ability to absorb energy and revert it to strength, so he was not going to stop her. She stared at him for a moment, then turned and kicked the door.

It shattered. The metal didn’t just bend; it shattered into a thousand pieces. And Magneto realized then that Shaw must have been saving his energy up just for such an occasion as this, only he had thought things would turn out quite differently.

“You’re going to hurt them,” Magneto warned, careful not to tell her exactly who ‘them’ was. She already knew, and there was no need to say the name.

Rogue ignored his warning and started walking away, her movements jerky and almost robotic as it was the first time in nearly a year that her legs had been used.

XXXXXXXX

“I can’t do this,” Kitty told him. He was following her as she stormed away from Emma and the others, and John could barely keep up with her she was walking so fast. “I just can’t,” she said, finally stopping in front of a door long enough to open it.

They stepped into what looked like a large, empty globe, and John looked at her curiously, wondering where they were. Then the world around them shifted as panels flew from the walls and a landscape was created.

In all appearances, they now stood just outside of the school, with Emma Frost walking towards them. Kitty walked over to her and punched the woman again.

“Hey, what are you…” she glared at John and he paused. “Why did you hit her?”

“I didn’t,” Kitty told him sharply. “Haven’t you ever been—” She punched Emma again, “in the—” another punched and her jaw was broken, “Danger Room?” Kitty asked, kicking Emma so hard she landed against the ground with a loud ‘thud’ and appeared to be out cold.

“Uh…no,” he answered, looking around nervously. A place called the ‘Danger Room’ didn’t sound like much fun.

She sighed and walked over to him as the images around them faded and they were standing in the large globe of a room again. “It’s a training program the Professor designed. I helped him with some of the programming, but it was mostly him,” she explained. “It allows us to test our powers without actually doing any damage.”

Then Kitty shifted back to what she’d been saying before. “John, I just can’t watch her be a teacher here. I can only imagine the crap she’s going to teach, and I’m confused as hell as to why the Professor—who can read her mind—hired her at all!”

He reached out and pulled her into a hug. “I’m sure he knows what he’s doing.” What a fucking lie that was. John didn’t trust Xavier, and he probably never would, but he wanted to calm Kitty down.

She sighed again. “I know. I just don’t want her around.” Kitty lifted her head and looked at him. “I’m so glad you’re back.”

He kissed her forehead and decided to lie again. “Me too.”

XXXXXXXX

Rogue stared at the mansion, and even though she knew this was where she would find the X-Men, she was hesitant to walk through the front doors. This wasn’t their home, after all. Their home had been destroyed, and the Avengers were merely being hospitable.

She was shaking, still cold because all she had to wear were the tattered remains of the clothes she’d been wearing before she’d…woken up? She couldn’t remember. But the clothes were covered in dried blood.

She jumped at the sound of a woman’s voice. “Hi, can I help you with something?” the blond woman asked, looking skeptical and worried all at once at the presence of such a strange sight.

“Who are you?” Rogue asked.

“My name is Carol Danvers,” the woman replied, looking a bit surprised that she didn’t already know who she was. “And you are?”

 


	5. Chapter 5

“[Every secret of a writer's **soul** , every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written large in his works.](http://en.thinkexist.com/quotation/every_secret_of_a_writer-s_soul-every_experience/263534.html)”

~ [Virginia](http://en.thinkexist.com/quotes/emily_carr/) Woolf ~

 

**Chapter 5**

He hadn’t written anything in a long time. There was a part of John’s soul that could only be brought out through ink on paper, and he had neglected it. It was the one part of himself that he had yet to share with Kitty.

If things went as he wanted them to, she wouldn’t know about it until long after everything was said and done.

The pen stayed in his hand, completely still, and he finally realized that as much as she made him want to write—and she did—he couldn’t. Not now, not when things were about to happen the way they inevitably would.

Words spilled through his mind and around his thoughts constantly, and yet he could not put them down on paper. There was something about Kitty’s presence that was inspiring and hindering all at once—like the things she made him feel.

It killed him that he would give up _fire_ for her.

“Is that your journal?” John jumped in response to the voice and closed his notebook quickly, dropping the pen as if it had bitten him. He turned to see who the speaker was, and surprisingly it was Warren.

“Uh..” John glanced back at the notebook, then up at Warren again. “No.”

“Oh,” Warren shrugged, his expression becoming very serious. “You and I need to talk.”

“About what?”

“Kitty,” Warren replied, and right away John knew he wasn’t going to like this.

“Why?” John asked him. “Are you jealous?”

“Not at all.” Warren’s expression softened. “But I do care about her, so let me put it this way: break her heart and I’ll break your legs.”

John laughed quietly. “That’s what this is about? The big brother ‘don’t hurt her’ speech?”

Warren thought for a moment, then smiled, “Yeah, that’s pretty much it.” He forced his smile away. “But don’t. I’m serious.”

John just shook his head and stood up. “I don’t plan on it.” Lie.

“Good,” Warren agreed. “Now that that’s said, I was wondering if you could help me with something.” John raised an eyebrow in question. “The new stove,” Warren started, “there’s something weird going on with the burners. I figured you could track the fire down and figure out exactly what it is.”

John panicked inside. He didn’t want to do this; this wasn’t why he’d come back, in fact it was very much the opposite of why he had returned. But he kept his composure, as practiced at it as he was, and merely replied, “Yeah, sure.”

They walked in silence for a while, until Warren finally spoke. “So, you’re staying for a while, right?” Why did everyone keep asking him that?

“Yeah.” John replied.

“That’s good,” Warren commented, before kicking off of the ground and flying up to change a light bulb. “Kitty needs you around.” He landed back on his feet lightly and looked at John.

“What are you, maintenance guy?” John asked, trying to change the subject.

Warren smiled. “Nah, but I do what I can. Most of this stuff’s paid for by my account anyway, so I wanna make sure it works.” That’s right, John thought, because he was a billionaire or something.

“So anyway, about Kitty,” Warren continued, and John actually made a face behind his back in response to him bringing it up again, “the week school starts will be a year since Rogue died.” Warren’s voice changed to be somewhat grave, though they both knew he hadn’t known her for very long.

“Oh.” Had it been that long? John hadn’t really counted the months he was gone. Just the days. The never-ending, needed-to-get-her-in-his-arms-again days.

“Yeah,” Warren continued. “So it’s good you’re here.”

They entered the kitchen—still under construction but definitely a step up from the last one, John noticed. In fact it looked more like a restaurant kitchen rather than a school’s. Warren motioned towards the stove, which seemed entirely too small for the rest of the room, and pointed at the back burner.

“It’s that one,” he explained. “You turn it on and they all go off.” John glanced at the oven, then back up at Warren.

“And you want me to do what?” he asked.

“Just tell me where the fire starts,” Warren answered. “You can do that, right?”

_No._

“Sure.”

“It’ll be just like finding Logan’s cigar,” Warren commented with a grin as he leaned over and turned the oven on. “Storm told us how she figured you did that. Pretty smart.”

“Yeah, whatever,” John commented, turning all of his attention away from the rich pretty boy and to the tiny flame that now flickered beneath the oven.

He could feel it, like the oven was breathing and the fire was escaping iron lungs that argued with it all along the way. John had missed this, just letting go of the world and focusing on the one element that had always been a comfort to him. He could use a little comfort right about then; actually, he could use a lot.

Then it started, the flame jumped from one burner to another and spread until they were all on. He saw it jump in his mind’s eye, felt it take that leap into the unknown, landing somewhere where it could be free and grow.

“See what I mean?” Warren asked. “It does that every time. Scared the crap out of one of our cooks.”

John just nodded, keeping his attention on tracking that tiny fire. That was when things got out of control—the burners spit fire up from the oven, high enough to scorch the ceiling.

“It’s never done that before…” Warren said, staring at the black marks on the ceiling in surprise.

“Turn it off,” John muttered, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of the oven.

“What?”

“Cut the gas! Turn the fucking thing off!” John shouted, and with each word he said the flames grew, forming into a ball of fire that engulfed the entire top of the oven. Warren glanced at him with wide eyes, then reached for the knob—ignoring how hot it was—and turned the oven off.

Its fuel gone, the flames died away nearly instantly, and John fell to the ground. Warren reached down to help him up, but completely ignored the offer and struggled until he was standing again on his own.

“What just—”

“Drop it,” John snapped.

XXXXXXXX

“I think she’s one of Xavier’s students,” Carol commented, and for the hundredth time, Tony Stark glanced over at Rogue. The girl looked back at him with empty—but observant eyes—staring past strands of white hair mixed with brown.

He knew her face, and he knew that Carol was right. In fact, if he wasn’t mistaken, this girl before them had actually not only been a student of Xavier’s but one of his X-Men as well.

“We should call him,” Stark commented, and Carol nodded.

“I didn’t want to do anything until I’d spoken with Steve and Hank, but since they’re gone, I came to you,” she explained, glancing back at Rogue. Stark could tell the young mutant’s presence troubled Carol.

“Does she remember anything?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” Carol walked over to Rogue, completely wary of the girl’s jumpy reaction to the slightest of movements. “Hi, do you remember your name?” She asked, using her public smile to be welcoming and hopefully let Rogue know she was a friend.

Rogue shook her head. It was obvious in the look she gave that this question had already been asked and answered. “Do you remember anything?” Carol asked.

She appeared to think about answering this first, as if she didn’t completely trust them, which in all actuality in a world like today’s was smart. Tony couldn’t blame her for the lack of trust at all.

“Hey, have you guys seen…” Rogue’s eyes followed the sound of the new voice to where he stood in the doorway, still wearing the costume that only he could get away with.

“Not now, Pete,” Stark commented, turning his attention back to Rogue. He noticed that Carol kept her eyes on Peter though, taking in the appearance of his new Spiderman costume.

“Black?” She asked, raising an eyebrow.

Peter Parker shrugged, “Yeah. Time for a change.” He glanced at Rogue. “Who’s this?”

“She’s one of the X-Men.” Carol replied.

Rogue’s head snapped quickly to face Carol, and she glared at the other woman. It took seconds, maybe even less, for her to reach for the older woman and grip her neck tightly. There was nothing that neither Stark nor Peter could do, because as they watched they saw Carol’s life being sucked out of her.

“I know who she is,” Tony commented all at once, the realization clicking in his mind. “Rogue!” She ignored him and continued to hold onto a struggling Carol. He had to stop this, and he had to stop it fast, because his friend was dying. But how do you stop someone whose mere physical contact can kill you?

Peter tried throwing some webs at her face and pulling her back, but Rogue brushed them off, able to hold Carol with one hand now as she stole the other woman’s powers. It wasn’t only the strength that she had taken though, because they were lifting off of the ground, hovering nearly a foot above where they’d been standing.

That was all he could take. Tony lept forward, tackling Rogue and throwing her onto the floor with him. He glanced back in time to see Peter swoop in and catch Carol, setting her onto a nearby couch and running for the phone.

Stark stood up, ready to fight Rogue if he had to, but she was looking at him as if completely lost and confused. “What…what happened?” She asked, staring up at him with scared eyes.

He ignored the question and walked over to Peter as he hung up the phone. “Don’t talk to her. Something we said set her off, so just watch her, but don’t talk,” he told him.

Peter nodded in response and watched as Stark left the room. He glanced back at Carol, hoping she would last until help arrived.

XXXXXXXX

“What happened?” Sebastian Shaw opened his eyes and looked around, not at all pleased to see Magneto standing before him. He immediately assumed the mutant had something to do with the dull pain in the back of his neck.

“You let yourself get stupid,” Magneto replied, his voice emotionless. He was unafraid of the man before him, even when he wasn’t weakened by Rogue’s mutation. “You absorb energy, but you forgot that Rogue does as well, and her ability is quite a bit more painful than yours.”

He glared at Magneto, suddenly remembering what had happened. “She got away?” he asked.

“Of course she did,” Magneto replied. “Did you really expect her to stay around and help you with your plan?”

The door opened and there stood Emma Frost, complete in her White Queen costume and with a glare on her face. “I don’t want to be there anymore,” she complained to Shaw, ignoring that he was obviously hurt. “I can’t be around them without killing one of them soon.”

“Shut up,” Shaw snapped. “The girl escaped.”

Emma looked around. “Which one?”

The memory of Illyana’s disappearance returned, and his angry mood shifted to furious. “Damn it.” He glared at Magneto, deciding to blame everything on him. “If you had let the Hellfire Club handle things the way we wanted to, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“You’re right,” Magneto commented. “You would have marched into that half-built school and been beaten within moments by a handful of teenage students with more experience in this sort of thing than you know.” It was a dry sarcasm Shaw had learned to ignore, but this time it irritated him.

He turned his head to look at Emma, as if suddenly realizing she was there. “You can’t keep coming here. They’ll find out!”

“Relax,” she said with a smug grin. “I’ve got my psy walls up and working in Xavier’s mind. If he suspects anything, he doesn’t know what to think of it.” Emma folded her arms proudly. “How else do you think I got him to even hire me?”

 


	6. Chapter 6

“[No life that breathes with human breath has ever truly longed for death](http://en.thinkexist.com/quotation/no_life_that_breathes_with_human_breath_has_ever/156046.html)”

~ [Alfred, Lord Tennyson](http://en.thinkexist.com/quotes/alfred,_lord_tennyson/)~

 

**Chapter 6**

He stared up at his reflection in the mirror, an image that hardly seemed familiar to him anymore. John Allerdyce had torn himself apart from the inside out, seeking what exactly it was about Kitty that made him feel whole.

The answer had been something he couldn’t grasp, something there were no words for, no image worthy to portray, and that was why this was killing him so damn much.

Where did you find the pieces of yourself that someone had put back together for you? If you didn’t even know the sequence they fit in, then how could you question that they were even really where they were supposed to be?

He had to trust her.

John had to trust her completely, and that scared him more than anything ever had.

He knew he couldn’t do this alone. As much as he wanted to keep everyone away from it, to shelter their eyes from what was ahead, he couldn’t. Maybe the others wouldn’t care so much, and that might make this easier for him. Or maybe he was kidding himself and they would do everything in their power to stop it. It was one of the X-Men’s fucking mission statements, after all.

He sighed, glanced down at the lighter he’d left for Kitty, and then looked back up at his reflection. “Come on,” he muttered to himself, “give me something. Anything but this.”

“Talking to yourself?” He jumped in surprise and turned to see Kitty standing in the doorway looking amused.

“Thought the Professor was making you guys present your first week’s lesson plans today,” he commented, suddenly wondering why she was there rather than off being busy with the school business that had taken so much of her time the last few days.

Then there was that half smile he loved as she looked at him. “I’m taking the afternoon off,” Kitty explained as she walked over to him, “which means I’ve got a few hours to do whatever I want.”

“Really?” he raised an eyebrow as she wrapped her arms around his neck—John still wasn’t quite used to letting someone show him affection, but it seemed to make her happy when he did.

Kitty nodded, smiling as she looked into his eyes. “And what did you want to do?” At this question her smile became a smirk.

John looked at her for a moment, then smiled. “Kitten, I’ve ruined you, haven’t I?” he asked, and although he sounded like he was teasing, it was a question that he actually wanted the answer to.

“No,” Kitty said, taking him by surprise, “no, you saved me.” He started to argue and she put her finger to his lips to shut him up. “I know, I know,” Kitty said. “I’m not supposed to say that, because that’s not the way things went. You came back, I helped you see you weren’t the villain, I saved you, blah, blah, blah,” she looked right into his eyes as she spoke, “but the truth is, if you hadn’t been there I wouldn’t be here now.”

She looked at the floor, smiling in embarrassment, “It sounds so lame, but you really did give me a reason to keep living, John.”

“Kitty…”

“And every day I find more,” she continued, “I look at you and I see hope.”

“Listen, Kitten, I…”

“John,” he got quiet when she said his name, “let me keep this.” She leaned her head against his chest and listened to his heart beat, “Please, just give me this moment.”

His mouth opened to begin arguing again, but he forced himself not to. As she listened to his heart, he thought for a moment that maybe her request had been quite literal, and not completely about the moment. Very suddenly he wanted to tell her that she’d been given his heart a long time ago, but he stopped himself from saying that as well.

Instead of speaking, he just held her there, where they stood in the middle of her room. John closed his eyes for a moment and proceeded to commit everything about her to his memory, so that if he ever lost this closeness, he would be able to recall it in his darkest moments.

The calm before the ever-approaching storm. He opened his eyes, glancing at his reflection over her shoulder, and realized that things were about to get very overwhelmingly complicated. This was all they had before things started to get bad, and he was not letting this moment go.

He lifted her face towards his, looked at her for a moment, then kissed her, and he was surprised at how ready she was for it, as if expecting it almost. This wasn’t just a kiss though; this was John, telling her he never wanted to leave her again. It was a claim that she belonged to him, and Kitty seemed to agree completely, letting him lead the kiss as she leaned against the wall and his hands gripped her back to pull her closer.

This was an “ _If I die tomorrow…”_ kiss, a cautionary goodbye for the tragedy that would strike again soon, because it always inevitably did for people like them. It was hopelessly heartbreaking and emotionally comforting all at once. It was raw devotion and complete passion.

That was why John nearly killed Remy when he opened the door and spoke, “There’s somethin’ going on downstairs…”

“Get the hell out!” John snapped, glaring at the red-eyed mutant.

Kitty, however, could see the worry in Remy’s eyes. “What is it?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Logan was talkin’ on da’ phone and then he just went crazy,” Remy replied, ignoring the way John was glaring at him.

“Big deal. He always fucking does that!” John said, and not for the first time he wondered why everyone was always so surprised when Logan acted like an animal.

“Dis is different.”

Kitty looked into John’s eyes apologetically, then moved towards the door. John flicked his lighter open, thought about burning the shit out of Remy’s face, then decided to just follow them both downstairs instead. He just didn’t have the energy to fight right now.

XXXXXXXX

“Logan?” Kitty didn’t recognize him. He looked broken, and in this state he was more feral and animalistic than she’d ever seen him before. He was dangerous.

Kitty glanced at Remy and Warren, “Where’s the Professor?”

“On his way,” Warren replied, “he must have been in Logan’s head, cuz he was arguing that he didn’t want anything else to mess with his mind a while ago.”

“How long has he been like this?” she asked.

“Since he hung up the phone.”

Kitty glanced at the phone, then back at Logan, approaching him slowly. He couldn’t hurt her, but she didn’t want to make him violent around the others. “Logan,” she tried again, “Logan listen to me.” He turned around to glare at her, teeth bared, claws extended from fists that were ready to hit someone, “I need to know what’s wrong.”

“Is it me?” Logan asked suddenly. “Do I have a damn sign stapled to my forehead that asks them to keep doing this! It isn’t fair to them, and it keeps happening!” He turned and punched a large hole into the wall, making them all jump.

“Logan, what the hell happened?” Kitty demanded, and her tone was so fierce that everyone—including Logan—turned to look at her in surprise.

“The people I care for shouldn’t be forced into this sort of thing!” he yelled.

“What sort of thing!” she matched his tone of voice.

“Rogue’s back,” Logan told her, his voice getting quieter as he finally spoke those words aloud. Suddenly everyone in the room knew why Logan was acting the way he was. This wasn’t the first time someone he loved had been brought back from the dead, and things had not ended well last time.

“What do you mean?” Kitty asked quietly, calming down with him.

“They don’t know how,” Logan explained, motioning towards the phone, “She just showed up all bloody and…” He didn’t need to finish.

“Where is she now?” Remy asked.

“The Avenger’s Mansion,” Logan answered, “and they said she just tried to kill one of them.”

“What?” John asked, finally speaking. He had stood by, watching the scene silently, wondering how the hell this was possibly happening again, but when he had heard that Rogue was trying to kill someone, the very idea was so out of character that he couldn’t keep silent.

“She went crazy and attacked one of the Avengers,” Logan said, irritated. “Do you need me to write it down for you? Would that help?” he asked in dry sarcasm.

Kitty stepped between them both without even thinking about it, and looked at Logan, “We have to go get her.”

Logan had already come to this conclusion—it was apparent in the look he gave her, “I know.”

“And if she tries to kill someone else we’ll have to—”

"I know,” Logan repeated, not letting her finish. “I’ve had practice at this sort of thing,” he muttered, walking towards the door.

The Professor showed up about then, watching Logan walk away as he lit a cigar, and he didn’t even make a comment about not smoking in his school. Once Logan was gone, he sighed deeply.

“This is much more complicated than he knows,” Professor Xavier announced.

“What do ya mean?” Remy asked, looking at Xavier in confusion.

“When does Storm get back?” Kitty asked.

“She should be back this afternoon,” the Professor answered, with a tone of voice that said he wished she were there now.

“We can’t wait that long,” Kitty told him.

“No,” Xavier replied, “we can’t.” He looked at her, “I want you to lead the team, Kitty.”

“Me?” she asked, completely in shock at the very idea.

“Yes,” he replied, “we need someone who can keep things together and—”

“I’m not a leader!” Kitty argued.

“Yes, ya are,” Remy told her, his red eyes focusing on her face, waiting for her reaction.

“And if something goes wrong?” she asked.

“It won’t be your fault,” John said quietly. She turned to look at him, and somehow—he could see it in her eyes—she knew he wasn’t just referring to what they were about to do. Kitty’s eyes locked with his as she realized she’d been lied to, that John had something to tell her that he had purposely avoided.

XXXXXXXX

“Charles is more powerful than you know,” Magneto commented, giving Emma an indifferent look. They both knew that if anyone were to be a perfect judge of Xavier’s character, it would be him.

“Don’t underestimate me,” she said darkly, eyes narrowing as she looked at him.

“Oh, of course not,” he agreed, “so far the Hellfire Club has done an excellent job with their part of the plan.”

“You didn’t warn Sebastian about her powers,” Emma said accusingly.

“Actually,” Magneto argued, “I gave him a rather long explanation of both her ability and the after affect.” His voice was dark to match the glare he was giving her. “His pride closed his ears like usual.”

“You don’t think this is going to work,” Emma commented, amused.

“I know Charles better than anyone, my dear,” he replied, “and he is not a force to be reckoned with.”

“You’re the one eager to get revenge on the X-Men,” she pointed out, raising an eyebrow.

“Yes, but that does not include Charles. I could never hope to outsmart him enough to actually win a fight with him. He’s too clever, and I guarantee that he is already very aware of your presence in his mind. He may even have allowed you access for reasons of his own.”

“I don’t—”

“She went to the Avengers,” Shaw announced in anger as he entered the room. “Of all the places to run to, she went to the bloody Avengers!” he yelled at Magneto.

“That was the last place she saw them before her death,” Magneto told him, not looking surprised at all. “It makes considerable sense that the Avenger’s mansion is the first place Rogue would look for them.”

“She nearly killed one of them,” Shaw told Magneto, and at this he raised an eyebrow. “They set her off without even…” he trailed off, sighing in frustration, “I don’t want a group of superheroes who have the government backing them up after the Hellfire Club. All I ever wanted was the X-Men, and only then because of…” He paused.

“Well, Jean is dead,” Magneto said simply, knowing what the other man hadn’t said aloud.

“And that is why the X-Men will pay,” Shaw replied, “especially the Wolverine.”

Emma, who had listened in silence since Shaw’s entrance spoke up now, was grinning proudly, “You’ve already made him more angry than he’s ever been.”

“Good,” Shaw replied, “but it’s not enough.”

XXXXXXXX

_What kind of a name is Wolverine?_

He glared at the building, eyebrows bunched in frustration, claws still extended. Logan could handle not knowing every piece of his past in detail, he could even take the idea that somewhere a long time ago he had been a very different man than the person he was today, but this? He couldn’t take this.

Not again.

_Logan, please! Kill me!_

Suddenly, he felt each and every wound that had reopened the night he had taken Rogue into his arms and brought her back. He could almost feel the blood trickling down his skin again, smell it as flesh reopened. In that moment he had only had one thought: _If I die, it’s okay, but save her. Please._

The connection had given him glimpses of Rogue’s life up until the moment she had met him. He had seen her grow up, had even witnessed her first deadly kiss, and he had felt the heartache and guilt that moment had thrown at her. The feeling would be with her for the rest of her life, every time she got close to someone.

Mostly though, he had felt her fear. The fear that if she ever got close to someone, if she ever even brushed past someone on the street, bumped skin against skin, she would be back home, standing in her room, crying because someone was dying for merely touching her.

He pulled a cigar out of his jacket pocket and lit it without thinking twice about it, throwing the dead match—because cigars never tasted the same if they weren’t lit by a match—onto the pavement. Logan realized that this moment was something he could hold back no longer, as much as he dreaded what he may see once he entered the building.

So he sheathed his claws and took a step forward, and he kept walking until he was at the door. He walked through it, and Stark was the first to see him. Past tension between the two made them both hesitate for a moment, and then they moved past it, both concerned about the one person who should not have been there at all.

“Where is she?” Logan asked, taking a deep breath.

“She’s in the other room with Peter,” Stark explained, “but she’s…she doesn’t remember much. It’s possible that she won’t—”

Logan walked past Stark and into the room. He gave Peter a glance, raising an eyebrow at the sight of Spiderman in black, then proceeded to look around at the rest of the room without saying a word.

She was sitting in the corner, knees tucked up under her chin, tears falling from her eyes. Logan’s cigar fell out of his mouth, and he nearly fell to the ground himself.

XXXXXXXX

Rogue looked up at him through strands of white hair, eyes barely able to focus past the tears, and she knew only one thing: he was safety. The man standing in front of her, he was more than a friend, she was sure of that much, but that was all she knew. He was here to save her, to help her.

Logan took a step towards her, and for the first time since her return, she did not flinch when someone reached out to touch her. Rogue was still very aware of her mutant curse, but she also knew, somehow, that this handsome man knew what would happen if he truly touched her and would thus be careful.

He ran a finger down her white hair, then his eyes looked into hers, and she knew right away that the tears he was looking through were an odd thing for him. He didn’t cry, at least not when anyone was around to see it, but he was crying now.

Tears fell down his cheeks silently, and he had his mouth open as if to speak but kept silent. His hand moved from her hair to rest on her shoulder lightly as he continued to look directly into her eyes.

“Rogue?” Her questioning look revealed to him that she did not remember that name, so he tried again, “Marie.”

Her eyes lit up and she knew that he had just said her name. Without a doubt, she knew it. Rogue smiled at him and nearly whispered, “What’s your name?”

XXXXXXXX

Kitty zipped up her X-suit and turned to look at John, “I don’t think I can do this.”

He walked over to her, flicking his lighter along the way, and stopped to stand right in front of her, looking down at the unsure look in her eyes. “You’ll do fine,” he promised.

“I don’t know…” she argued, looking at the floor.

“Kitten,” he made her look back up at him, “you can do this.” The surety of his voice made her actually believe it, though she was still afraid. How odd was it that something John Allerdyce told her brought her comfort?

“What happens if she tries to kill someone else, and we have to choose whether or not to…?” Kitty paused. “That’s the kind of choice they always force the leader to make.”

John turned her around to face the mirror he’d been looking in earlier, and he wrapped his arms around her from behind, locking his hands gently at her stomach. “Look at her,” he commented, “she’s the strongest person I know.”

Kitty started to say something, but he continued before she could, “And if anyone can do this, it’s her.”

This wasn’t John Allerdyce. Not in the sense of the person he had once been. This was the man who Kitty Pryde had created from the ruined ashes of a broken person. He was momentarily letting go of any remnants of Pyro that would forever cling to him, and he was letting John break through to give her the strength she needed.

“John, I’m scared,” Kitty finally admitted, nearly whispering. “She was my friend.” Tears threatened to form in her eyes, but she fought them. “I’m not strong like Logan. If I have to…I’m not strong enough…”

“You won’t have to,” he whispered into her ear, catching her eyes in her reflection with his, “And I’ll be right there,” he added. For a moment he didn’t know what to say, and then words practically whispered themselves into her ear, “I’m yours, Kitten. Take from me whenever you need to.”

John closed his eyes and just held her, and Kitty didn’t quite know how to react.

 


	7. Chapter 7

“Love is watching someone die.”

~ Death Cab For Cutie “What Sarah Said”~

 

**Chapter 7**

Something was on Warren’s mind. Kitty knew that much. When he pulled her aside for a moment before they walked into the Avenger’s mansion, she wasn’t surprised.

“Are you sure it was a good idea bringing him along?” He was glancing at John, looking almost fearful.

“Warren, I thought that you of all people would understand that he’s not the person he once was,” Kitty said in disbelief. “Now you’re telling me that you think he’s—”

“It’s not that,” Warren said, cutting her short. “I mean with his powers acting all crazy and everything, I just figured that…” He trailed off when he saw the look on her face. “Didn’t he tell you?”

“Tell me what?” she asked.

Warren sighed and suddenly realized he’d made a mistake, but there was no backing out now. He continued, “The other day in the kitchen, his powers went out of control and he almost burned the building down.”

“What?” Kitty asked. “No, he would have told me if…” She looked at Warren’s face. “Damn it,” Kitty muttered.

“Hey, you guys coming or what?” They glanced over at John and Remy, who were waiting by the door.

Kitty looked at Warren, then back at them and headed towards the building. They would need to talk about this later, because now she was more than worried about John.

“They’re in the other room,” Stark explained, answering Kitty’s question before she even asked it as they walked into the building.

Kitty nodded and opened the door cautiously, taking a step inside. She looked around the room, and it took her a minute to notice them over in the corner. Logan had his hand on Rogue’s shoulder, and he was talking softly to her, telling her something that must have been comforting because she looked relieved.

“Logan?” Kitty spoke his name quietly, and both he and Rogue looked up from their conversation. Rogue looked frightened at the new arrivals but Logan assured her they were friends and she seemed to trust him.

Logan walked over to them, though he kept his eye on Rogue. “She doesn’t remember a whole lot,” he explained.

“Is she…” Kitty paused, “Can we take her back to the school?”

“I think that’s a good idea,” he replied. “It’s just that…” He looked over Kitty’s shoulder in surprise, and everyone glanced at the doorway to see who he was now glaring at. “What are you doing here?”

Emma appeared to be insulted by the question. “I’m a teacher. I came as soon as I heard,” was her reply.

Logan didn’t seem to like Emma Frost. Kitty couldn’t blame him though, because everything about her just seemed…wrong. She hated that Emma was here now, when Rogue needed no one but her friends, and she could only imagine how Logan felt.

He looked back at Kitty, “I’ll take her back,” he told her.

“Okay,” Kitty nodded, “but we’ll be right behind in case something…” He gave her a look of understanding, which she was grateful for since she didn’t need to say what she was thinking.

XXXXXXXX

She was pissed about something, John knew that much. What he didn’t know was what was making Kitty so angry. He hated not knowing, so as she slammed her bedroom door behind her without saying a word, he opened it again and followed her in.

“Kitty—”

She didn’t give him a chance to speak as she turned around and glared at him, “Why didn’t you tell me!” Kitty demanded.

“What are you—”

“I had to find out from Warren that you lost control of your powers and almost burned down the school!” she continued. “When did this happen?” Kitty asked. “When did we stop talking about these things? Did you think I wouldn’t want to know that something like this was going on? What is it? Why the hell didn’t you tell me!”

He looked at the ground and took his lighter out from his pocket, flicking it open and closed over and over again. The clicking sound brought him comfort for some reason. When he didn’t answer her, she started again.

“I should have known something was wrong, right?” Kitty said, scoffing, “I mean, you were just acting too damn caring!”

At this he looked up at her and the expression on his face was almost one of hurt. “I _do_ care,” he spat the words almost bitterly, because they tasted funny in his mouth and it stung to say them.

“Do you?” she asked, sounding altogether disappointed and desperate.

“I came back,” he reminded her. “Do you know how hard it was for me to do that?”

She scoffed again, rolling her eyes, “Oh I’m sure it was the most difficult thing you’ve ever done!” Her tone was completely sarcastic.

“No, it was the _second_ hardest thing!” he said, raising his voice, and he finally had her attention. “The hardest thing I’ve ever done was walking away from you,” he added quietly.

There was a moment of silence where her mouth hung open, ready to speak words that she just couldn’t seem to say.

“But, I never planned on coming back,” he continued, ignoring the look she was giving him, “and it was fucking painful when I realized I had to!”

“ _Had_ to?” she asked. “And why pray tell did you _have_ to come back?”

“Because, I…!” he started yelling, then stopped himself. “Because,” he started again, much calmer, “I’m sick.”

Kitty looked like she was going to fall down at those words, like she just couldn’t stand anymore, and though he wanted to John stopped himself from grabbing hold of her shoulders to steady her. “I’ve got the Leg—”

“DON’T!” she yelled so loud John was sure everyone in the mansion had heard, “Don’t ever say that word around me,” Kitty finished, quieter but still not calm, because the tears in her eyes were now falling uncontrollably.

“Kitty, I won’t let you be in denial about this!” he shouted. “You can’t just pretend it isn’t happening because I’ve got the fucking virus and it’s _killing_ me!”

“No,” she said, forcing a smile, “no, it’s not around anymore. The last year there have only been three reported cases. They never found a cure, but it went away on its own and…”

“You know that isn’t true,” he told her. “Mutants are still dying from it everywhere. We’ve just gotten used to the idea.”

“This isn’t happening,” she muttered, looking slowly around the room, trying to avoid looking at him. “This can’t be happening.”

“It is,” he said, and Kitty finally looked at him, “It is happening, and ironically…” He looked at her, “I just needed to see you again before…” Kitty walked through him and the wall behind him, leaving him alone in the room, “I die,” he finished, leaning against the wall and slumping down to the floor, where he stared forward with blank eyes.

XXXXXXXX

“So, she was a student here?” Emma asked Warren.

“Yeah,” he replied, “I didn’t know her all that well.” It was a guilty admission that he wished he had gotten to know Rogue better.

“She’s beautiful,” Remy commented a bit absent-mindedly, and both Emma and Warren looked at him like he was crazy. He looked at them, “Well, she is.”

“What’s her power?” Emma asked.

“It’s not really a power, more of a curse from what I’ve heard,” Warren replied. “When she touches people, she…it’s like she drains their energy.”

“Really?” Emma asked. “That’s different.”

“So she can’t touch anyone?” Remy asked.

“Not unless she wants to kill them,” Warren answered. “Which makes me wonder how Ms. Danvers is doing.” The Avengers had been careful to avoid talking about Carol Danvers the entire time the X-Men had been at their mansion.

“Warren!” Storm rushed over and hugged him, a huge smile on her face. She pulled away and motioned towards a blue mutant who stood in the doorway, “Remember I told you about Kurt?”

“Hey, when did you guys get back?” Warren asked.

“Just now,” she answered, smiling. “Feels good to be back.” No one said anything for a moment, and she took in the expressions on their faces, her smile fading. “What happened?” Storm asked.

XXXXXXXX

There are those moments where your life crashes down around you, of course, but then there are those moments where time just seems to stop and all you can feel is that agony that starts from your heart and makes its way throughout your entire body.

“I don’t know what to do,” Kitty said, glancing down at Peter’s headstone. It was odd that this had been the first place on her mind when she’d tried to think of where to go. Now, tears falling down her cheeks, she kneeled in the grass before his grave, desperate for some sort of comfort she knew the cemetery would never give her.

“I can’t do this again,” she added, nearly whispering. “I mean, I…” She wiped her tears away from her face and tried to stop crying. “It’s just too much. The virus was letting up, it was starting to go away on its own by some miracle, and now…” Her voice caught in the back of her throat.

“What am I going to do?” she whispered, and the answer hit her so hard that she nearly fell back.

_Be with him._

“I don’t know if I can do that,” Kitty told herself, that inner voice that always knew what the right thing to do was whether she ignored it or not. Then she heard a different voice entirely in her mind, it was Storm’s voice from not so long ago.

“ _It won’t be easy. You’ll want to give up, you’ll wonder why we even bother? At times you’ll have no hope at all. But then one day, you’ll see the face of someone you’ve saved, and you’ll know that it was worth it. Even if only for that_ one _person.”_

She stood up slowly, staring down at the headstone, and for a moment Kitty didn’t move. She glanced to her right at the new school and realized that Storm had been completely right. Though this was going to be hard, probably the hardest thing she would ever do.

XXXXXXXX

The first thing Kitty noticed when she paused in the doorway was that he was packing his bags. “John?” He didn’t look up at her. “John, what are you doing?”

“I’m leaving.” It was a simple answer, but it stung. “You made it clear that this is too hard for you so…” Finally, John looked up and turned to face her, “so I’m not going to put you through it.” The look on his face gave nothing away, but she knew him well enough to know that this was as hard for him as it was for her. He was just better at hiding it.

“The virus has changed,” Kitty explained, hands moving to rest in her back pockets as she looked at the floor. “You’ll have longer than the early patients did.” He nodded, but didn’t say anything. “John,” Kitty walked over to where he was standing and took his bag out of his hand, setting it onto the floor beside them. “Don’t go.”

XXXXXXXX

Kitty looked right into his eyes, taking hold of his hands in hers. “Please,” she said quietly, “I don’t want you to go through this alone.”

“I was wrong to ever come here,” he told her as he sat down on the edge of the bed. “It’s probably the most selfish thing I’ve ever done,” he admitted. “I’m such a fucking bastard.” He held his head with his hands in frustration, staring at the floor.

Kitty sat next to him. “If you hadn’t come back I’d never have been whole again.” He looked up at her and saw the tears in her eyes as she stared forward at the wall. It was as if John could almost see through her eyes, because he knew somehow that she was going through the symptoms of the virus in her minds’ eye, remembering what each of them was like.

“I’m glad you came back,” she finally said, smiling through tears as she turned her head to look at him.

“How am I going to do this?” he asked her. There weren’t tears in his eyes; he just didn’t cry as easily as he’d used to around her, but there was a sadness in his eyes that seemed to tear at her in such a way that he could see it in her own.

“With me by your side,” was her answer.

It was cliché, and John was damn tempted to tell her that too, to laugh and make some sarcastic remark about how she’d been watching the Hallmark channel way too much lately. “This wasn’t how things were supposed to end,” he told her.

He meant it too, because when he had left her he’d made a promise. “Some day, we’ll finish this,” and he hadn’t meant that one of them would die and the credits would start rolling. This changed everything, and he knew it too. He knew that Kitty knew it, and that somehow, when she survived and he didn’t, she would never be the person she had once been again.

He _had_ changed her.

“Kitty?”

She glanced over at him, “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry for this.”

She looked away, focusing her gaze on the floor looking thoughtful. “Me too,” she finally told him.

XXXXXXXX

The newly rebuilt garden outside of Xavier’s school was still and silent, until all at once in a burst of light and sound, a young woman appeared out of nothing. She stood there for a moment, looking down at the grass where her feet rested, then looked up at the school.

Her body was strained, weakened from using powers she hadn’t been aware she even had, and her eyes were red from lack of sleep as she had tried to master those powers in a short enough time to survive them.

To her left was the school, tall and towering over every tree around it, and to her right was a small memorial graveyard. She couldn’t breathe as she noticed the headstones and made her way over slowly. Then she saw it, and suddenly she was breathing so fast she thought she might pass out.

She fell to her knees before one of the headstones and began to weep, one hand reaching out to rest on it as she read the name. _Peter Rasputin._ “My dear brother,” she whispered through her sobs.

 


End file.
